Delhi bids Sheila Dikshit farewell

As a milling crowd of party colleagues, political rivals and distraught well-wishers of former Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit converged at the Congress headquarters at 24, Akbar Road to pay their last respects, the hearse that transported her mortal remains from her residence to the party office and was slated to continue the procession to the Delhi Congress office and thereafter to the crematorium broke down almost in stubborn refusal to let her go. Laden with strings of white flowers and a life size portrait of the leader, the vehicle took close to half an hour to be fixed delaying the procession.

The signs were all over that Delhi already missed her. Minutes after Dikshit was cremated with full state honours, in a CNG-operated furnace as per her last wish and on one that she had installed during her last term as CM, the dark skies opened up in a relentless pour. The daylong drizzle was nothing like parched Delhi had witnessed over this monsoon.

While most people agree that Dikshit had lived a full life, the suddenness of her passing away shocked her family, friends and well-wishers. Till Friday, the Delhi Congress chief had been locked in a bitter exchange of unsavoury letters with the AICC incharge of Delhi PC Chacko over organizational changes made by her unilaterally and without keeping the former in the loop.

On Saturday morning, she collapsed and was taken to Escort Hospital, where her cardiologist Dr. Ashok Seth and a multi-disciplinary team of specialists tried to resuscitate her but she passed away later in the day at 3.55pm.

On Saturday evening her mortal remains were brought to her airy upscale apartment in Nizamuddin East where top leaders including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, former External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal and deputy CM Manish Sisodia, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi, former PM Manmohan Singh, LJP leader Sharad Yadav paid their tributes. Leaders cutting across party lines trickled into her residence all evening and late into the night. With heavy VIP movement in the area, several Delhi residents just took a glimpse of her house from outside as their way of bidding her goodbye.

Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal and his deputy Manish Sisodia arrive to pay tributes to former Delhi CM Sheila Dikshit at her residence, in New Delhi. Photo by Piyal Bhattacharjee / BCCL

On Sunday morning even at the AICC headquarters leaders from across political parties streamed in to pay homage. “She was a friend… almost an elder sister. This is a big loss for the Congress party,” Sonia told reporters. She was accompanied by daughter and AICC general secretary Priyanka Gandhi and her husband Robert Vadra. Congress chief Rahul Gandhi, who is in the United States, conveyed his condolences to Dikshit’s son and Congress leader Sandeep over the phone.

BJP chief Amit Shah, Kejriwal and Sisodia attended the funeral at Nigambodh Ghat, where the AAP supremo and once a Dikshit baiter almost oversaw the arrangements. The AAP government has announced a two-day state mourning in Delhi.